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Message: <blockquote data-quote="bret" data-source="post: 593007" data-attributes="member: 713">I'll take an example from one of my favorite RPGs (GURPS) to answer this.GURPS is not balanced. By this, I mean that how useful 8 points in a certain skill depends heavily on the setting and the skill chosen.In a TL7 (modern era) game, 8 points in broadsword just isn't going to be as generally useful as 8 points in Guns: Pistol. If there is any combat, the person with the gun is generally going to be more useful and effective than the person with the broadsword.In a TL2 (Roman Empire) world without anyplace to make ammo, the person who put points into broadsword is generally going to be more effective in combat.If instead you put the points into something like Diplomacy, it is going to depend on how important combat ability vs. interaction is in a game.If people have to be able to support themselves, it is quite possible that putting the points into something like Carpentry or Computer Programming is going to be more useful than any of the previously mentioned options.You are spending the same 8 points to create a character. Since it is a classless system, anyone could take the skills (with GM approval). Some skills are just more useful than others. Provided everyone has the same opportunity to buy/learn those skills, this is still fair. It just isn't balanced.Like in the real world, there are just some things that are more effective than other things.To further the point, I've played in a game where my 200 pt GURPS Mage (who was focused on Divinations and Healing rather than combat) was not a problem. Since I had about the same level of protection as most of the other players, I was at equal risk in combat. When it came to combat, we has some 100 pt. melee characters that were more effective than my mage. That wasn't really a problem, because I was useful enough to the group in other ways that it was worth it for the group to bring me along.My mage still got time in the spotlight. My mage wasn't able to overwhelm the combat abilities of a character made with many fewer points. It wasn't even a problem for the GM to balance combats and other challenges.On the other hand, it did become a problem for the GM to judge combat difficulty in that game when on of the players got Plate Mail while all the other characters were trying to get by with light armor. All of the sudden, anything that could hurt that character would be a one-hit kill on many of the other characters. In the case of several characters, we didn't have enough strength to be able to wear that heavy of armor. In other cases, we just plain couldn't afford that type of armor.The significant thing in my opinion is there was too large a disparity in what sort of challenges various members of the group could survive. Suddenly, one of the characters became nearly invulnerable compared to others in the same group to a certain type of challenge.To carry this into a system like D&D, given one player a lone 10th level Sorcerer with no offensive combat spells is not going to be fair when you have the rest of the group at 1st - 2nd level. The character has a better combat ability (hit points, BAB, saving throws, equipment) and is able to survive just about anything that the other characters could. It isn't that the character doesn't have anything unique to them, it is just that the character would overshadow every other character in the group.There is a fairly large problem in D&D when character levels get spread out too much. It becomes difficult to even protect a low level character well enough that they could survive the challenges that higher level characters are meeting. Look up any thread about Leadership feat, you don't take those 1st and 2nd level followers with you anyplace that is risky.Does this better illustrate what I mean when I say a game has to be fair but doesn't have to be balanced?Edit: Some Grammer and one of my comparisons had a cut and paste error, making it silly.</blockquote>

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